When matters were brought to this state, Moses went up again to Mount
Sinai, of which he had told them beforehand. He made his ascent in their
sight; and while he staid there so long a time, (for he was absent from
them forty days,) fear seized upon the Hebrews, lest Moses should have
come to any harm; nor was there any thing else so sad, and that so much
troubled them, as this supposal that Moses was perished. Now there was
a variety in their sentiments about it; some saying that he was fallen
among wild beasts; and those that were of this opinion were chiefly such
as were ill-disposed to him; but others said that he was departed, and
gone to God; but the wiser sort were led by their reason to embrace neither
of those opinions with any satisfaction, thinking, that as it was a thing
that sometimes happens to men to fall among wild beasts and perish that
way, so it was probable enough that he might depart and go to God, on account
of his virtue; they therefore were quiet, and expected the event: yet were
they exceeding sorry upon the supposal that they were deprived of a governor
and a protector, such a one indeed as they could never recover again; nor
would this suspicion give them leave to expect any comfortable event about
this man, nor could they prevent their trouble and melancholy upon this
occasion. However, the camp durst not remove all this while, because Moses
had bidden them afore to stay there.